I live in Phoenix Arizona, the 5th largest city in the country and until recently, one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas in the United States.  While the rate of this growth has slowed for the time being, there are still questions and concerns of a sustainable future for this desert community.  The desert, mountain preserves,  and outlying areas are being swallowed up by many thoughtless and thoughtful developments that impose plans to change the face of this landscape forever.

The relationship of man and coyote has always been one of a symbiotic nature.  Not only as a thriving creature in suburban areas of North America, but also as a mythological character.  My work has never been bound to any specific indigenous mythologies, but the trickster mythology in this series of paintings is relatively acknowledged as a part of the over all narrative, as I am half native american: Navajo and Laguna Pueblo.  For the Navajo in particular, the coyote plays an important role in mythology, representing an unpredictable and ambivalent creature constantly testing and pushing the limits of behavior. Through his actions he reinforces concepts of harmony and order for the Navajo. 

As a personal interpretation, the coyote in the work represent a figure of inventiveness, evasiveness, and is a creature of incredible adaptation.  I’m interested in the coyote as an instigator to a larger narrative of the philosophical and psychological.  I’m re appropriating this iconic kitsch image, usually seen as a howling yard ornament into a broader statement on the American psyche, at least in the southwest.